8.

Ultrasound Imaging Physics

Suzanne Amador Kane, Physics Department, 370 Lancaster Avenue, Haverford College,
Haverford PA 19041. These curricular materials were developed with funding from the Howard
Hughes Medical Institute and Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Updated 10/2008
All photographs are courtesy American 3B Scientific Ultrasonic Echoscope manual; all line drawings
Suzanne Amador Kane, 2003, Introduction to Physics in Modern Medicine, Taylor & Francis, Inc.)
Additional Readings: American 3B Scientific Ultrasonic Echoscope manual (in binder in the lab);
Suzanne Amador Kane, 2003, Introduction to Physics in Modern Medicine, Taylor & Francis, Inc.

1. Introduction
We usually think of images as being formed from light (or other invisible forms of
electromagnetic radiation such as x-rays.)

In fact, many animals use sound to image their

environments. For example, bats use sonar ranging to detect obstacles and potential prey (such as
moths) or predators (such as owls). Dolphins use a special organ in their head (the melon) to
perform similar sonar functions underwater. The principle of sonar, or pulse-echo imaging,
works when the animal emits a pulse of sound, which then travels outward at the speed of sound,
vs, of the surrounding medium. If the sound wave is reflected from an object, it then travels back
to the source and is detected as an echo at the source. Thus, the sound wave travels a distance
equal to twice the distance from the source to reflecting object, L, in a time T, related by the
equation:
L = vs T/2

Eq (1)

Consequently, if the animal measures the time elapsed between the emission and receiving of the
sound pulse, T, it can compute how far away the reflecting object is, L, if it knows the speed of
sound. (Recall that the factor of 2 accounts for the round-trip taken by the sound pulse.)

Figure 1 Schematic depiction of a bats sonar ranging method for finding prey, such as the moth shown
here. Bats emit clicks 3 to 20 milliseconds long, with frequencies in a range that depends upon species.
Some bats use audible sound, others ultrasound (25-90+ kHz)

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The bat emits high-pitched clicks with frequencies largely above the human audible range of 2020,000 Hz. Such high frequencies are called ultrasound, but they do not differ from audible
sound in any other aspect. Humans have adapted sonar ranging for numerous reasons. We use it
in our introductory labs in distance sensors.

Sonar ranging is used to detect submarines,

obstacles and schools of fish underwater. Most recently, medical physicists have discovered how
to turn ultrasound imaging into a powerful tool for studying body structure and function. For
example, medical ultrasound imaging is an important imaging method for obstetrics (imaging the
fetus in the uterus during pregnancy), internal medicine (abdominal imaging, among others),
cardiology (imaging the heart and circulatory system), and cancer imaging (e.g.,distinguishing
tumors from fluid-filled cysts in the breast and abdomen). In this laboratory, you will explore the
acoustics of ultrasound and understand how one can make sophisticated imaging devices using
these phenomena.
We suggest that you check out this amazing website to learn more about one application of
medical ultrasound imaging in more detail: http://www.ob-ultrasound.net/
WARNING: The device you will use today is test equipment designed to teach physicists
and doctors about ultrasound imaging. It does not use the same intensities as a diagnostic
imaging device and you should not use it on your own body. (One of your professors
already tried it out to see what would happen, and the high intensity sound produced a
highly painful sensation!) However, regular diagnostic ultrasound imaging is painless
because of the lower ultrasound intensities used.
2. Principles of Ultrasound Imaging
Let us review the basics of sound waves before proceeding to a more detailed explanation of their
use in imaging. Sound waves are longitudinal waves involving the alternating compression and
rarefaction of a medium, with a power determined by the waves amplitude. 1 The speed of sound
waves is a constant independent of frequency, wavelength and direction in fluids and many
materials. Some typical values of the speed of sound for relevant materials are shown below. We
will use the first three values; values of interest for medical imaging are also noted.

Material

Speed of sound (m/s)

Air
Acrylic (polyacrylate) plastic
Water
Soft tissue (average value)
Muscle

344
2690
1500
1540
1570

This is true only for isotropic (spatially uniform) media. If you have time, you can actually learn
how to also excite transverse sound waves in solids that support such oscillations. Consult the
manufacturers lab manual for more information.
1

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Fat
Bone

8-3

1440
3500

Figure 2 A) Ultrasound transducer. B) Schematic of transducer construction. C) Depiction of pulse

echo/sonar ranging mode operation.
You are also provided with two ultrasound transducers (Fig. 2). These are devices that convert
electrical energy into sound waves using piezoelectricity.

The black working end of the

transducer is a piezoelectric crystal that undergoes mechanical deformations when a voltage is

applied across it. If the applied voltage is AC, the piezoelectric vibrates in response. Very short
AC voltage pulses are applied by the scanner, mimicking the bats pulses and the actual
ultrasound pulses used in medical imaging. The same transducer emits brief ultrasound pulses,

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Ultrasound Imaging

then acts as a receiver to detect the returning echoes. (Fig. 2C & Fig. 3) The scanner contains a
computer that records the time required for each pulse to return, then uses the speed of sound to
convert that into a distance to the object producing the echo. (Fig. 3(b)) An A-mode display (A is
for Amplitude) results when the echo intensity is plotted vs. the time for the echo to return.
Peaks in the echo intensity occur at those times corresponding to distances at which reflective
interfaces occur in the body. Such a plot can be converted into a plot of echo intensity vs. depth
using Eq. (1) if the speed of sound is known.

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Figure 3: Illustration of the operation of an ultrasound pulse-echo scanner.

By itself, an A-mode plot of amplitude vs. Time/Depth is not very revealing of anatomy.
However, if one moves the transducer back and forth, one can measure the two-dimensional (2D)
locations of objects: the depth (y) comes from sonar ranging and the transducers position
supplies a second (x) dimension. In this fashion, one can collect 2D maps of body anatomy. This
is typically displayed by making a 2D map of reflected intensity as a function of x (transducer
position) and y (depth). The echo intensity is indicated by actually plotting a variety of intensities
on a computer screen, and assigning a gray-scale of white to gray to black depending upon how
intense the actual echo was. This map of echo intensity vs. position is called a B-scan, where the
B-mode name stands for brightness. It is illustrated in Fig. 3(b). Note this is always a crosssectional image only. In modern ultrasound scanners, the ultrasound beam can also be scanned
in a second dimension to accumulate many cross-sectional images, from which a 3D image can be
assembled.
3. What determines the intensity of ultrasound echoes?
The quantity for sound waves that determines the intensity of echoes is called the acoustic
impedance, z, the product of the density and speed of sound of a medium:
z = vs

(2)

Imagine, for example, that a sound wave travels from a medium with one speed of sound into one
with a different speed. At the interface, there will be an incomplete coupling of the sound waves
energy into the next medium, resulting in a reflected wave. A similar result holds when the
inertial mass of the medium instead changes. (In Physics 213 lecture, you may have seen this
effect manifested as the failure to solve the wave equation with the correct boundary conditions
between two media without a reflected wave. That more complete treatment explains why its
the combination z that matters, rather than just density or speed of sound alone.) The intensity of
sound reflected from an interface between two materials with different values of acoustic
impedance is governed by the equation (Fig. 4):
Itotal = total intensity of incident sound wave
Irefl = intensity of reflected wave (echo)
Itrans = intensity of transmitted wave

(3)

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Figure 4 Schematic illustration of the geometry used in defining Eq. 3

Thus, mismatches in acoustic impedance are what create sound reflections. The greater the
acoustic impedance mismatch, the larger the intensity of the reflected sound wave or echo.
Conversely, if two different materials have an interface, but they have the same acoustic
impedance, no echo will result, an important phenomenon called impedance matching.
Within the body, different organs and tissues have differing acoustic impedances. The following
table gives a few important values:
Materia
l
Fat
Water
Muscle
Bone

z [kg/(m2s]
1.30 106
1.50 106
1.65 106
7.80 106

As a practical matter, this means that when sound waves travel through the body, they will reflect
from interfaces between bones and skin, or muscle and fat. If we can use sonar ranging to
measure the distances between these interfaces, then we can map out the positions of all
reflecting surfaces. By measuring how intense the reflections are, we can also determine how
great an acoustic impedance mismatch caused them. This can give information about the types of
tissues encountered as the ultrasound travels through the body.
Since air has almost zero density compared to plastic, its acoustic impedance is also close to zero
compared to that of human soft tissue, or the plastic objects we will image today. As a result, if
you did not use a coupling gel to form a seal between your transducer and body or plastic block,

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100% of the ultrasound intensity would be reflected back, and none transmitted. Coupling gels
are used in this fashion in medical imaging as well. Be sure to use gel in each of the following
exercises.
4. Ultrasound absorption and Time-Gain-Compensation (TGC)
You might think that medical ultrasound should always use the highest frequency attainable,
since that will give the best spatial resolution.

However, that assumption leaves out one

important fact: the absorption of ultrasound increases with frequency. As a result, ultrasound
imaging is a tradeoff between spatial resolution and achievable depth of imaging.
As sound (or ultrasound) travels through a medium, it is absorbed by the molecules within. This
absorption is proportional to the incident ultrasound intensity, so the resulting absorption results
in an intensity that depends exponentially upon distance within the medium through:2
Itrans

Itotal

exp(-x/D)

(4)
Here the relevant intensities are the total incident pulse intensity, I total , and the transmitted
intensity remaining after absorption, Itrans . Here we are using x to refer to the depth within the
sample, and D is the penetration depth, a quantity with units of distance that determines how
deep the sound waves travels before being attenuated by e-1.
As a result, if one plots successive echoes as a function of Time/Depth, you will see a rapid falloff in intensity due to two effects: the absorption factor from Eq (4) and the reflected losses from
Eq. (3). In practice, D depends upon the frequency of sound as:
D ~ 1/f

(5)

This means that lower frequency sound waves can travel farther before being absorbed by the
same amount, an important effect in imaging structures deep within the body.
Where does the ultrasound energy lost to absorption go? Mostly heating in this laboratory, but in
medicine high intensity ultrasound can also cause cell disruption (due to the shear forces from
the associated compression-rarefaction) and cavitation (the creation of bubbles due to low
pressures at the rarefactions). Thus, medical ultrasound used in continuous wave (CW) mode,
without pulses, is used as a therapeutic agent. It can be used at very high levels to destroy

Here we only consider attenuation due to absorption and specular reflection. In an actual ultrasound
imaging experiment, one might also encounter losses due to scattering from small objects and diffuse
reflections from rough surfaces. The ultrasound pulse also spreads out as it travels through the medium, so
there is a falloff in intensity due to this geometrical effect.

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tumors, and at lower intensities to relieve pain and inflammation.

You may have received

ultrasound therapy in sports medicine that makes use of these ideas.

5. The size resolution of ultrasound images improves with increasing frequency
The frequency of a sound wave determines its wavelength, , through the equation:
= vs / f

(6)

The wavelength of a sound wave also determines how small a feature will produce a distinct
reflection. In other words, the higher the frequency, the better the spatial resolutionthe smaller
the separation at which one can distinguish echoes from two distinct, nearby objects. Hence, the
frequency sets the size of the smallest feature one can image within the body using ultrasound.
Prelab Exercise 1: Compute the wavelength of your 1 MHz and 4 MHz transducers now for
acrylic and soft tissue, and record them in your notebook. Remember this will depend on
speed of sound! Write down a few examples of what features in the body could usefully be
imaged using each transducer.

Lab 1: Echo ranging to measure distances

Today, we will be using a 3B Scientific Ultrasonic Echoscope modeled on actual medical units.
First, examine the front panel of the Echoscope, shown below in Fig. 5. This device provides the
electrical signals to emit and receive ultrasound pulses.

You can control the intensity of

ultrasound emitted and the gain (amplification) of the echo signal received.

You are also

provided with two ultrasound transducers (Fig. 2). The ultrasound produced has a central
frequency of 1 MHz (MegaHertz) (blue transducer) and 4 MHz (green transducer). To begin,
connect the 1 MHz transducer into the Reflection probe socket, item (12) in Fig. 5. Make sure
switch (11) is on Reflect. NOT Trans.; this enables the sonar ranging (pulse echo) mode.
DONT DROP THE TRANSDUCERS! THEY ARE FRAGILE! BECAUSE THEY ARE ROUND
AND WILL ROLL, PUT THEM IN A BOX WHEN NOT IN USE! THESE ARE HIGH
VOLTAGE DEVICES. TREAT THEM WITH RESPECT!
The ultrasonic gel you are using is nontoxicthis is the same water soluble gel they use in
actual medical exams. You clean up your hands with soap and water after using it.
Locate the ~ 1cm thick acrylic block. Use the calipers supplied to measure its thickness in mm
and record your value. (See the Appendix (posted on Blackboard) about using calipers if you do
not know how to.) Now, use the Ultrasonic coupling gel (white squeeze bottle) to squirt a little
gel (somewhat more than the toothpaste you put on your brush) onto the transducer head. Press
the transducer head against the top surface of the acrylic block and move it around to form a

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good seal with the gel (Fig. 4A). You will now see how to use this setup to measure the distance
from the front to back of the plastic plate using sonar ranging.
Next, turn on the control unit using the power switch at the bottom right corner (Fig. 5). The
Receiver power switch (5) above the transducer socket allows you to select the power of the
ultrasound pulse emitted from the transducer. This can be adjusted in 5 dB steps, from 0 to 35
dB. (Recall that a decibel is a logarithmic scale for power; each increase of 10 dB corresponds to
an increase in power of a factor of 10: dB value = 10 log (P 2/P1), where the log is to base 10.) Set
the power knob (5) to 15 dB for now. Knobs (1) through (4) control the gain by which the echo is
amplified. Turn these in the full CCW position for now.

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Figure 5 A) Ultrasonic Echoscope unit with front panel labels. B) Typical start screen.
You are finally ready to start the software (it should be an icon on the desktop named:

As h_eng.exe

; double-click on it to begin.) You should see a screen something like Fig. 5B. Note

that you can at any time select from the top menu File/Print Screen. This will allow you to record
plots of your most important data when requested; you should also answer all questions and
perform all calculations contained in the following exercises.
You should be observing on the top of your screen a plot of sound intensity vs. Time (in s).
Select from the top menu Display and select A-scan and HF-Data. You will see a signal with
rapidly varying amplitude with time; this is called the HF (high frequency) data and it
corresponds to a plot of the actual piezoelectric voltage received vs. time. The variation of this
signal reflects that of the actual original ultrasound pulse (at far left starting at zero time) and the
reflected echoes (at greater times).

The envelope modulating this signal is called A-scan (for

amplitude) and it can be displayed alone, or the HF data only can be displayed. The variation of
the HF data shows everything you want to know about the ultrasound pulses. Take a few
minutes now and play around with ways of using the toolbar buttons for Zoom In, Zoom Out
and the button labeled 100 or 200 to see how to vary the x-axis scale. Then, use the arrows at the
leftmost side of the top plot to vary the y-axis scale. (The bottom plot shows the Gain of the
device vs. time. It should correspond to a flat line at 0dB, indicating that the received echoes are
being multiplied by a constant factor of 1 at all times. This will become more interesting later on
when you adjust the Gain.)

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Using the red and green cursors provided, measure the time separation between two adjacent
closely-spaced peaks of the HF data and confirm your transducers frequency value. (To do
cursor measurements in x, click and drag the cursors where you want them. Their values and the
separation are automatically displayed at the bottom of the display.) Because the HF data consists
of brief pulses, it cannot be entirely at one frequency, however. Select the STOP button from the
toolbar, and then hit the rightmost button labeled FFT. A new window will pop up that displays
the frequency Fourier transform of your signal. Where is the Fourier transform peaked? What is
its width in Hz? (Note you can use the cursors on this plot; the values are displayed at the bottom
of the FFT window.)

What about the original signal determines the width of its Fourier

spectrum?
Once you have a plot that looks approximately like that in Fig. 5B, do the following exercises:
1) The plot you see displays the actual voltage received by the transducer as it emits an
ultrasound pulse (leftmost pulse) and receives echoes (second and higher order pulses to
the right).;

compare Fig. 6.

The separation between the first and second pulse

corresponds to the time in Eq. 1; measure the time using the amplitude maxima of both
pulses using the cursors provided. Use this time and your measured distance to check
the speed of sound, using Eq. (1); include uncertainties (error bars) in all your results,
here and throughout this lab.

Input the correct speed of sound (top menu item

Setup/Sound Velocity); compare your value to the nominal value for acrylic is given in
the Table above. Then, select the Depth mode so you are directly displaying plots vs.
Depth. (You can do this from the toolbar, or the X-axis top menu item.)
2) Next, using the second, thicker acrylic block provided, measure its thickness using the
calipers. Now check its thickness using the transducer (remember to use coupling gel).
Record your new plot of A vs. Depth and your results, including uncertainties. If there
are any discrepancies between your measured values using ultrasound and the calipers,
propose reasons for the discrepancy.
3) Try changing the power setting from 0 to 35 dB while watching the A-mode plot. Record
the changes in A at a fixed Depth when you vary the output Power; how do these agree
with your expectations?

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Figure 6 A) Ultrasound transducer in position above thin acrylic plate and B) resulting pulse echoes
measured in A-mode.

Lab 2: Echo intensity

Now you will record the reflections between two blocks of plastic. First, take your setup from the
previous exercise, and now place another plastic block under the first.

Does the signal change?

Does the ultrasound pulse travel from the first block into the second? (What does that interface
actually look like?)

What would you expect to see if you saw additional echoes from the

additional interfaces? Now remove the second block and use a little coupling gel to form a seal
between it and the second block; repeat the measurement. Now what does your signal look like?
Why is it different from the first exercise?

Figure 7: Apparatus for measuring reflections for small acoustic impedance mismatches
Now you will introduce ultrasound into a water bath, as shown in Fig. 7. (Remember to set the
speed of sound to that for water!) Using the black plastic holder provided, place the 1MHz
transducer against the water bath so it seals (use gel!) Place the acrylic or black plastic POM
(polyoxymethylene) block attached to a crossplate and dial on top; set the dial so the ultrasound
hits the black block at normal incidence (90 degrees on the dial.) Now, collect an A-scan of the
resulting echoes and describe what you see. Try moving the plastic block (keeping its angle
fixed) to see how this changes the plot. This last scan is actually more similar to a medical
imaging setup than the earlier exercises, since you are now sending ultrasound pulses through

Ultrasound Imaging

media with fairly similar values of acoustic impedance.

8-13

This means that there is enough

ultrasound intensity after the first interface to penetrate into the plastic block and allow imaging
of both interfaces. Similarly, in medical imaging, ultrasound can penetrate fairly far into the body,
allowing one to measure the locations and acoustic impedance mismatches of many different
interfaces. The varying echo intensities can be displayed to give information about the types of
tissues encountered.

Lab 3: Absorption of Ultrasound and Time-Gain-Compensation

We can measure the absorption falloff as ultrasound travels into the body using the following
experiment. Set up the 1 MHz transducer with the phantom (acrylic block drilled with holes) as
shown in Fig. 8. In this orientation you can generate echoes from equally spaced holes ~1cm
apart, but slightly displaced side-to-side. This means you can compare the intensities from
successive holes at depths equal to 1cm, 2cm, 3cm, etc. with little effect due to multiple
reflections. Record the echoes from each hole, starting at the most shallow, while steadily sliding
the transducer to the left. You should be able to visualize the exponential fall-off in echo intensity
readily.

Measure the intensity of the first echo and make a quick plot using your favorite

spreadsheet program to verify the exponential fall-off. (You can do this most easily by plotting
the intensity on a log scale and the depth on a linear scale, yielding a linear plot.)
Repeat your qualitative measurements with the 4MHz transducer to see how the absorption
varies with frequency. Print out your resulting plot. Based on this criterion alone, would a
higher frequency or a lower frequency transducer be appropriate for abdominal imaging? For
imaging the eye?

Figure 8

Setup for observing absorption as a function of depth and

frequency.
Since the decrease due to absorption follows a general exponential
law, we can correct for it by multiplying the signal by a gain
exponentially increasing with Time/Depth. This is shown in Fig.
9B, where the increasing Gain is shown at bottom, and the pulse
echoes are closer in intensity to each other as a result. Note that
since the Gain is plotted as a logarithm on the y-axis, this
exponential increase becomes a straight line. (Compare the flat

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Gain plot in Fig. 9A.) Since this correction requires the Gain to increase in Time to Compensate
for the decrease in intensity caused by attenuation, it is called Time-Gain-Compensation, or TGC
for short. This is a common feature of medical ultrasound imaging scanners, which need to
remove the uninteresting absorption effects to reveal the actual information due to body structure
or function. Otherwise, the medical images would always fade out with depth! Try out this TGC
technique with your experiment above to see if you can reduce the effect of depth-dependent
absorption. Comment on your results.

Figure 9. A) Illustration of a flat Gain profile as a function of time. In this case, the echoes received are
multiplied by the same factor (0dB or one in this case). As a result, the fall-off in intensity of successive
echoes due to absorption and multiple reflections are evident. B) Use of time-gain-compensation (TGC) to
provide a gain profile that increases with time over the echo pulse train to correct for absorption. As a
result, the pulses received are approximately comparable in intensity.
Set up your 1 MHz transducer so it is coupled to the 1cm thick acrylic block again. You should be
setup to see multiple echoes on your screen. Now, adjust your control units Gain settings as
follows: 1) Leave the Start dial fully CCW; 2) Turn Slope full CW; 3) Turn Width full CW; 4)
Turn Threshold full CW. Now you should see a plot similar to that in Fig. 9B. Try adjusting each
of the TGC settings individually and examine each resulting Gain plot to see what changes. You
can consult the labels in Fig. 9B to see which features to watch out for. Try to find the best TGC
settings for all four parameters that gives you the best correction (most uniform echoes) for all the
data visible. Remember how to do these adjustments for later exercises.

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Lab 4: Making an Ultrasound Image: B-Scans

You will now make a B-scan image by moving your transducer along a sample with different
features at different locations. Find the plastic block with holes drilled at different depths. (Fig. 10
A&B) Such objects are called phantoms in medicine; they are used to calibrate and check out
actual medical ultrasound devices. Make plots of the reflected echo profile for the shallowest and
the deepest holes you can image (recording which is the deepest hole for which you can see
echoes with the 1MHz transducer) and adjust your TGC so you get the nicest amplitude curve.
(You will probably have the start value before the first echo, and the slope and width adjusted to
encompass this largest reflection.) Now, look at the top menu and select B-mode from the
Imaging menu. You will get a new window that allows you to accumulate a B-scan. However,
you will have to move the transducer by hand so it passes over several holes at different depths.
Try this after first clicking on the Start button. Click on Stop after you have finished your Scan,
and examine the image.

Make sure you understand how the resulting plot agrees with

information about the depths of the holes you scanned over. (Note: we find that the transducer
can be difficult to move because the gel seals so well against the blocks, so you may not be able to
image all of the holes.) Print out and annotate your best image.

Figure 10 A) Acrylic imaging phantom with holes drilled at varying depths and separations. B) Using the
transducer with the phantom. C) Sample B-mode scan made by dragging the transducer in B toward the
right.
Actual medical ultrasound scanners actually have built-in mechanisms for sweeping the
ultrasound beam so as to automatically accumulate B-scans.

One method involves have a

transducer head that rapidly rotates to scan different angles;

another involves using many

adjacent transducer elements to fire ultrasound pulses in many adjacent, parallel paths, just as
you did by hand.

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Lab 5: Resolution depends on frequency

Now, pick up the phantom again and find the two small holes located very close together near
one of the ends. Position your 4 MHz transducer above the two holes, locating your transducer
along the narrower end of the phantom. Slide the transducer across the two holes from side-toside. What do you see? What do you see if you position the transducer exactly in the center of
the two holes? Why? Now, do the same test with the 1MHz transducer. Do you see any
difference as you scan across the two holes now? Why or why not? What has changed?

Lab 6: Depth of image depends on frequency because of

absorption
You might think after the last exercise that medical ultrasound should always use the highest
frequency attainable, since that will give the best spatial resolution. However, that assumption
leaves out one important fact: the absorption of ultrasound increases with frequency. Higher
frequencies offer better resolution, but at the cost of a shallower image; lower frequencies can
image deeper into the body, but with lower spatial resolution. As a result, ultrasound imaging is
a tradeoff between spatial resolution and achievable depth of imaging. To see that this is so, now,
use your 4 MHz transducer to image the phantom block drilled with many holes. Record which
is the deepest hole you can detect an echo for. How does it compare to what you found for the 1
MHz transducer?

Lab 7: Ultrasound imaging of a model Breast Tumor

Your setup includes a model of a female breast made of plastic filled with silicone oil to
approximate the properties of actual breast tissue (mostly fat and glands). Silicone oil has a speed
of sound of ~1000m/s. Located in the model are two lumps that approximate the properties of
benign tumors. Each is roughly 1 cm in diameter and can be located by palpating (pressing your
hand against) the sample, as is done in manual breast self-examinations. These models are used
both to teach women how to perform breast self-exams, to see what a tumor feels like, but also to
allow physicians to try out ultrasound imaging of suspicious lumps. You can use the real medical
ultrasound scanner to try to locate the strong echoes corresponding to each lump; try to locate
each by touch first so you know where to look, and remember to use gel to form a good seal. In
real medical applications, ultrasound imaging is a fast, noninvasive method for distinguishing
between fluid-filled cysts (which feel like tumors, but have generate no echoes within their fluid
centers) and solid tumors (which are filled with solid tissue that can generate internal echoes).

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If you wish, ask one of your instructors to show you a final demonstration of the actual
medical ultrasound scanner before the end of lab.
Final Write-up
You should include all answers, measurements and plots (with accompanying explanations) for
all underlined questions. You may enjoy answering these challenging questions in your final
writeup:
1) Bearing in mind the lessons learned from your experiments, what would be the
advantages and disadvantages of using the two different frequency ultrasound
transducer in medical imaging. What frequency might one use to image features within
the eye? Major organs located deep within the abdomen?
2) How could the idea of B-scans be improved on to allow 3D ultrasound imaging? (That is,
three spatial dimensions.)
3) Many body tissues have such similar values of acoustic impedance that only weak echoes
are generated at their interfaces. A contrast agent is a material introduced into the body to
enhance the ultrasound reflections, and thus enable imaging of a greater variety of
anatomical features. What would you need as a property of an ideal ultrasound contrast
agent? Can you think of any ways to enhance the contrast of body tissues?
Equipment List
All equipment for this lab can be ordered from American 3B Scientific;
American 3B Scientific
2189 Flintstone Drive, Unit O
Tucker, GA 30084

A complete listing of necessary equipment follows.

Tel.: 770.492.9111
Fax: 770.492.0111
info@a3bs.com

The only preparation required is to make

sure that the computer used has the English version of the software and all related drivers
installed and working with the LPT1 interface, as well as making sure the Echoscope is connected
to that interface.
1. Ultrasonic Echoscope (CP-U10010)
2. 1 MHz transducer (CP-U10015)
3. 4 MHz transducer (CP-U10017)
4. 1 cm and 2 cm thick acrylic blocks (CP-U10025 and home-made block)
5. Acrylic block drilled with holes at different depths (CP-U10027)
6. Plastic tank filled with water for absorption studies (CP-U10020)
7. Ultrasonic coupling gel (CP-XP999)
8. Heart Valve model (CP-U10029)
9. Polyoxymethylene Test Block (CP-U10023)
10. Model of single breast with benign tumor (L55/1 )

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